Meet the Woman Who Won the Title as 'Bacon Queen 2016'

Let’s face it, bacon is the most delicious food available. It improves pretty much any meal. Pancakes? Definitely better with bacon. Hamburger? Hell yeah you need to put bacon on it! Steak? You bet your ass I’m going to wrap my filet mignon in some of that greasy goodness! Bacon is like the Daniel Day-Lewis of food. It’s presence automatically makes a meal an award-contender.

The people at the Iowa Bacon Board agree with this sentiment, which is why they helped to create the Blue Ribbon Bacon Festival. It’s a giant event celebrating all things bacon. The highlight of the event is the crowning of the “Bacon Queen,” a beauty pageant for lovers of this meaty treat. This year’s winner was Allison Schafer.

Maharry Photography.

Allison said she wanted to be bacon queen ever since she was 18 and saw previous winner Kim Pfannebecker wearing a bacon dress. She immediately began training for the event by eating as many types of bacon as she could and applied for the pageant this year. Clearly she was born to win this honor.

“When I was growing up, my mom didn’t like the smell of bacon cooking in the house, so she always got the microwaveable pre-cooked bacon,” says Allison. “Once I got out of the house and into college, I kind of went wild and had all the bacon I could get.”

The theme for the pageant was “Body by Bacon,” (which happens to be my workout philosophy) and was based off 1980’s aerobics and fitness videos, which explains Allison’s hairdo in the previous photos. While she did not impress the judges in the 1980s trivia portion of the contest (she was born in the 1990s after all), she won them back by shooting a (fake) pig deer with her bow and arrow. This allowed her to begin her reign as the Bacon Queen during last weekend’s festivities.

“As Bacon Queen, my job is to spread bacon fellowship throughout the world and support the Iowa Bacon Board,” says Allison. “It was a tough job, but someone had to do it.”

It’s good to see in a world beset by vegans and kale worshippers, there are still people in the world promoting the most delicious piece of meat ever created. We fully support our monarch of the cured meat and hope Allison has a wonderful one-year reign!

Also, next year is the 10th anniversary of the Blue Ribbon Bacon Festival. I’m guessing they’re going to do something completely crazy to celebrate, and I fully intend to be there. And even if it’s not crazy, I still plan to eat as much bacon as my body could possibly allow.

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Joseph Misulonas is the Girls co-editor for Playboy.com. He really likes bacon. He can be found on Twitter at @jmisulonas.